


assorted bits and bobs

by snowdarkred



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Air Nomads (Avatar), Alternate Universe, Dragons, Fire Nation (Avatar), Gen, Multi, POV Outsider, Politics, Southern Water Tribe, Worldbuilding, ambassador zuko!!, zuko vs his advisors: the series
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-17
Updated: 2020-07-20
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:46:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 3,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25346428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/snowdarkred/pseuds/snowdarkred
Summary: The collected responses to Avatar: The Last Airbender prompts sent to me via tumblr.Fic prompts range from Zuko's competence as a Fire Lord to Aang missing Air Nomad cuisine.A number of them fit into the same universe as 'a nation, held.'
Relationships: Aang & The Gaang (Avatar), Aang/Zuko (Avatar), Sokka & Zuko (Avatar), Sokka/Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 49
Kudos: 497





	1. robinade: zuko surprising someone with competence

**Author's Note:**

> a while ago i asked for my tumblr followers to send me (non-steamy) atla drabble prompts; this is what i wrote for those prompts.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> robinade's prompt:
> 
> Zuko surprising someone by being competent at something they never expected him to be able to do! Bonus points if it’s Firelord Zuko :)

Yasu tapped his fingers impatiently against his knee. The boy Fire Lord was not paying attention. Oh, he nodded in the appropriate places, and to those further down the table he appeared as if he were diligently taking notes on their proposals. The trade agreement the Fire Nation had ratified with the Earth Kingdom was due to expire and new provisions had to be proposed, debated, and ultimately approved by the Fire Lord before they could move forward with the negotiations for the new one. 

And yet the boy Fire Lord was not paying attention. 

There were certain allowances that had to be made for royalty, and even more for _young_ royalty. But Yasu’s work was too important – to the Fire Nation and to his career – for it to be lost to the inattentiveness of a boy barely out of his teens. 

“Perhaps we should take a break and reconvene at a later time,” Yasu said after the boy Fire Lord failed to halt Professor Ayai and Councilor Yuudai’s bickering about historic fishing rights after an incredibly generous ten minutes. “The Fire Lord appears to have more important things that require his attention.”

He would have never uttered such a thing to Fire Lord Ozai, but his son was a softer beast.

The boy Fire Lord’s brush stopped, and he looked up. 

Yasu felt a flush of heat break across his body as he met the Fire Lord’s eyes. The boy may not be Ozai or Azulon or Sozen come again – not even close – but he certainly had his line’s piercing gaze. He felt like a kangaroo mouse under the sights of a war hawk.

“I assure you, Secretary Yasu, that my attention is where it needs to be,” Fire Lord Zuko said. He dipped his head at Professor Ayai, Councilor Yuudai, and the others who had been invited to share their views with the Fire Lord directly. “It appears that we have prior claim over those waters, dating back to well before the Hundred Years War. If we’re to feed our people while the economy recovers and farmland is still being redeveloped, we have to preserve those claims.”

The Fire Lord rose to his feet, sending a ripple of movement along the table as the gathered diplomats, experts, and advisors sprang up as well, like obedient flowers. He put aside the paper he’d been scribbling on and nodded at them all again. 

“However, Secretary Yasu is correct,” Fire Lord Zuko continued. “We should end this meeting here. I’ll have the palace attendants inform you of when we’ll be able to…reconvene to discuss the rest of the proposals.” 

As they all shuffled out in the wake of the Fire Lord, Yasu took a peek at what the boy had been doing – and blinked. There, painted in precise lines, was a map of the waters around the Fire Nation. 

Yasu was not told when or where the next meeting was.


	2. trcunning: zuko and fashion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> trcunning's prompt: Zuko and fashion, is there a fic there?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well, i took a swing at it at least

When Zuko became Fire Lord, he lifted the sumptuary laws on clothing. It wasn’t his first act, or his second, or his third, but as the Fire Nation transitioned their economy from endless war machine to one that actually traded with their neighbors, he had to allow them something to trade. Obviously weapons and warships were out of the question. 

Decades of legal restrictions had dictated people’s dress – what had started, centuries ago, as the natural outcome of having five sources of red dye native to the Fire Nation islands had become a mandated sign of national pride. From the lowest peasant up to the Fire Lord himself.

Once his citizens were certain he wasn’t going to remove their heads if they were caught wearing any shade more daring than pink, the streets of the major port cities exploded in color. 

The most expensive colors were shades of blue and purple. Only a few sources of blue dyes suitable for cloth existed around the world and all lay outside the Fire Nation. The Kyoshi Island blue that made their clothing so distinct from the rest of the Earth Kingdom was derived from a mineral found only on Kyoshi Island and around Chin Village. Both flatly refused to trade with Fire Nation merchants. Kyoshi Island had refused forcefully enough that one merchant who pressed the matter was shipped home with blue skin and a black mark barring him setting foot there ever again.

That left only the Water Tribes. They were all too willing to sell their blue and purple dyes…for a price.

A price so steep that even the richest merchants with the most demanding clientele balked at paying it. 

The Cloth Merchants’ Guild and the Dyers’ Guild both petitioned Zuko personally, complaining about being forced to pay through the nose for even a few _kin_ weight of the raw _curaq_ grass that made it. 

Zuko sat on the royal dais, wearing the robes Chief Hakoda had gifted him as a show of the new friendship between their people, unmoved. The deep purple inner robe complimented the more traditional red outer robe, and several of the merchants looked at it covetously. 

“Please, Fire Lord, we cannot possibly be expected to pay five gold per _kin_. The upfront cost alone is prohibitive, and not to mention how much we would have to charge our clients to recoup those costs. They will turn to Earth Kingdom merchants, who will use the opportunity to undercut our prices.”

“Does the price violate the terms of the Tsusho Agreement?” Zuko asked. “Do they charge a different amount to Earth Kingdom merchants?”

“No, but–” 

“Perhaps,” Madam Chouko, one of the more sensible merchants, interrupted, “if the Fire Lord wore such robes during his next public appearance?” She nodded to what he was wearing. “It would drive the demand up, which would justify the higher prices we need to offset the cost.”

Zuko frowned, running a hand over his robes. “Do you think that would work?”

“I think it would work very well,” Madam Chouko said, with a gleam in her eye.

And it worked very well indeed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> chouko from [a nation, held](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23320117) makes an appearance in this one!


	3. jujuberry136: dragons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> jujuberry136's prompt: 
> 
> Zuko and dragons (and Sokka's various reactions)?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sokka and zuko deserve bonding time that doesn't go completely off the rails, but this is not that time.

Sokka maintains that shrieking at the sight of a dragon whose head is bigger than your whole body is perfectly natural, thanks. Expected, even. Zuko doesn’t even mock him for it, which Sokka can’t bring himself to be thankful for, because again, it was a completely natural reaction to a huge dragon abruptly landing on the edge of your campsite.

Sokka is very glad they ditched Zuko’s royal guard at the start of this trip. Even the Fire Lord would have a difficult time explaining away a giant, supposedly extinct animal looming over them at sunset. 

Zuko goes over to talk to the dragon, although Sokka has no idea if the dragon can talk back. Aang had claimed that Roku’s dragon had given him a vision, but Roku’s dragon was also a spirit or a ghost or whatever mystical excuse there is for that sort of thing and might not be representative of his species.

Whatever the case, after Zuko communes with the enormous red flying lizard that’s interrupted their weekend away – a trip it had taken almost six months to convince Zuko he needed, by the way, because the man never takes a vacation unless nagged into it – he comes back frowning. 

“I think he wants us to go with him,” he says. Sokka sighs, put upon, and starts packing up their camp. So much for the vacation. 

Riding a dragon is not like riding a flying bison, and Sokka doesn’t enjoy it. 

They touch down on a mountain and trail after the red dragon as it leads them into a cave, where they see– 

“Are those eggs?!” 


	4. trcunning: aang and airbender cuisine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> trcunning's prompt:
> 
> Aang reminiscing about Air bender cuisine (or maybe just one dish) and the others trying their best to recreate it.

Trying to recreate a recipe from a century ago is hard, especially when all you have to work off of is the memory of a twelve year old. Katara does her best – she has Aang try ingredient after ingredient, trying to figure out what Air Nomad food tasted like based off of what he remembers. Toph awkwardly pats him on the arm every time he’s disappointed, which only makes Katara more determined to find _something_ that passes muster _._

It’s Sokka who has the idea to try the food from the communities _around_ the Air temples. Even before the genocide, non-Air Nomads had farmed and fished and traded in and around the temples for generations, and those communities still existed in some form today. Surely some of their cuisine crossed over.

The first time Aang has a sugar covered ball he calls papza mogu and the ancient granie who makes it calls something else he cries. It’s not a perfect match, because the butter and cheese curds are made with milk from hippo cows, not bison, but it’s the closest he’s tasted since he woke up. 


	5. trcunning: zuko hires a speechwriter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> trcunning's prompt:
> 
> prompt: An Ember Island Theater version West Wing. Who is the Fire nation's CJ Cregg? (Does Zuko hire a speechwriter?)

“You didn’t have much public speaking training, did you?” Jusha asks before she can stop herself. She almost slaps herself, but that would make things worse, wouldn’t it? She’s too old to make these kinds of mistakes.

“Is it that obvious?” the Fire Lord asks miserably.

Jusha’s not quite sure how she’s supposed to answer that. Fire Lord Azulon had thought her frankness was funny, thankfully, but his second son had not. Jusha had had to bite her tongue quite a lot during his thankfully short reign. Ozai’s son seems to be a different sort, but she hadn’t planned on testing things but throwing herself into the dragon’s path.

“You speak earnestly,” Jusha says diplomatically.

“So it’s very obvious,” the Fire Lord says. He’s tone is wryer than she expects. She sneaks a peak at his face, but it’s hard to decipher his expression. His golden eyes are as disconcerting as his grandfather’s.

“I’m just a clerk,” she says hastily, bowing. “I don’t know anything about it. Forgive me for speaking out of turn.”

That causes him to blink, and then he appears to make a concerted effort to soften his features. “It’s okay. I’m aware that public speaking isn’t my strong suit. What would you suggest?”

“What?” Jusha straightens in surprise. “Uh, pardon me?”

“You’re Jusha, correct? You served my grandfather and survived my father.”

“You recognize me?” She hadn’t expected that.

“You snuck Azula and I takoyaki during the autumn equinox festival when we were kids,” the Fire Lord says, looking a little bashful.

She remembers that. It was before Fire Lord Azulon died. The royal children had looked so cute in their little ceremonial clothes, but she had thought it was a shame they had to be stiff and formal for the whole thing. The takoyaki was easy to part with.

“You wrote a lot of my grandfather’s public addresses, didn’t you?” he asks. “They were good, from what I remember. Grandfather said you were an excellent writer.”

And Ozai had said he didn’t need any ink-stained scribblers writing his words for him and demoted her.

“Thank you,” Jusha says. The Fire Lord looks like he’s weighing something. Considering a course of action. He looks a little like his mother when he does, not that she got to spend much time with Lady Ursa before her disappearance.

“Clearly I need help,” the Fire Lord says, reaching a decision. “Would you do me the honor of assisting me?”

There’s only one answer she can give to that.

“I serve at the pleasure of the Fire Lord,” Jusha says.


	6. swingsetindecember: sokka/zuko, ambassador zuko

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> swingsetindecember's prompt:
> 
> sokka/zuko where zuko has to be the fire nation ambassador for a winter idk

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one was so fun!

Zuko drags himself upright through force of will alone. The darkness of the Ambassador’s quarters greets him. It feels like it should be morning now, but a deep, cold night hangs over the sky anyway. It always does these days. He feels the sun’s absence as a physical ache that no amount of meditation candles, stretching, or hot baths can sooth. His staff is faring much better than he is – he is the only firebender the Fire Lord had seen fit to assign this diplomatic mission. 

He knows why. He knew why as soon as the order was read to the whole court, so Zuko couldn’t even beg without losing what little respect the courtiers still had for him. Azula had stood next to him, stiff and unyielding, as whispers bloomed around them, and Zuko had no choice but to do the same.

Fire Lord Lu Ten might not have tried to have him murdered as their grandfather had, but he had sent Zuko to die all the same.

“Don’t worry, Zuzu,” Azula had whispered to him before he boarded the ship, “I’ll bring you home.”

Zuko was not reassured. 

And now he’s trapped at the South Pole with the Southern Water Tribe, caged in a doomed diplomatic mission with little chance of escape.

He will die here. It’s just a question of whether he will lose his mind first.

There’s a knock at the door, and then, before Zuko can call out, the door opens. Zuko startles and then stills. His staff would never open the door without waiting for him to respond; one close call on the ship south had been enough to convince them that surprising a firebender was a bad idea.

Zuko stays perfectly motionless in the darkness, trying to identify who was sneaking into his sleeping quarters. He lets heat pool into his hands, warming the air around him by several degrees. He’s not going to die quietly, no matter what Lu Ten or Azula or whoever might think.

There. Movement. A shadow against a shadow. When his would-be assassin finally creeps close enough, Zuko flares fire in his palms, flooding the room with light. He twists out of bed and to his feet, ready to burn whoever had come to kill him with a release of flames, when his good eye adjusts and the intruder’s identity becomes clear.

“Lord Sokka–” Zuko starts to say in surprise, but Sokka clamps his hand over Zuko’s mouth.

“Hush,” he whispers. Zuko withdraws his flames so he won’t burn the only friendly face he’s met since they pulled into port, and then he bats Sokka’s hand away.

“What are you doing?” he hisses back, mindful to keep his voice down. If the staff catches Sokka here, they’ll report back to Lu Ten, and then Zuko might have the pleasure of a warmer execution after all.

“Your staff is going to kill you,” Sokka tells him gravely.

Zuko stares. “And how do you know that?”

“We looked through their mail,” Sokka says impatiently. “They’re under orders to kill you.”

“Obviously,” Zuko says. Duh. Lu Ten is hardly going to let him stick around once his wife finally gives him a direct heir.

“What do you mean ‘obviously’?” Zuko sees a sharp movement that is probably Sokka throwing his hands in the air. “You know what, never mind. Where is your luggage?”

“What are you doing?” Zuko asks as Sokka begins rummaging around in his trunks. Zuko eyes the door and summons a tiny, candle-sized flame so they can avoid bumping into anything loud. Sokka’s brought a large sack with him and is now shoving Zuko’s possessions into it.

“I’m getting you the hell out of here,” Sokka says, trying to force a boot in with its mate. Zuko takes the sack out of Sokka’s hands and rescues his favorite pair of boots from being crushed.

“Lord Sokka,” Zuko begins.

“How many times do I have to tell you to stop calling me that?” Sokka demands.

“Would you prefer to be called 'Prince’ Sokka?” Zuko nods at Sokka’s grimace of disgust before moving on. “Look, I appreciate this, but if you help me, he’s just going to come after the Southern Water Tribe instead.”

“That’s going to happen anyway,” Sokka dismisses with a snort. “The Fire Lord is going to frame us for your assassination. So, yeah, if you don’t mind, I’m getting you the hell out before someone sticks a boomerang blade in you or you die in your sleep from, I don’t know what you call it, sun deprivation.”

Sokka reaches out his free hand and pulls Zuko into a fierce kiss that robs Zuko of any further protests and leaves him reeling. Sokka uses his speechlessness as an opportunity to shove a bundle of clothes at him. Zuko changes silently, tugging his darkest jacket on and lacing up his boots. His lips tingle.

Sokka finishes shoving valuables in the sack, and then the two of them soundlessly escape from the Ambassador’s quarters. The watchmen posted at the settlement gates nod to them as they pass, not even pretending not to have seen them, but no one says a word.

Zuko wants to stop and collect his swords from the ship, but the crew members would not hold their tongues.

Sokka leads him to a small skiff tucked out of sight of the Fire Nation vessel. They have Zuko’s things stowed away and are casting off in short order. The skiff, Zuko notes, is well stocked with supplies.

“Lu Ten isn’t going to give up just because I’ve disappeared,” Zuko says once Sokka’s skiff was out of the harbor. They’re hugging the coastline, he sees. Wherever they’re going, it probably isn’t far. “He’s still going to blame you and declare war.”

“Yeah, we know,” Sokka says. “We’re ready.”

“How? How could you possibly be ready for the full might of the Fire Nation?” Zuko demands angrily. What is Sokka doing, dragging him out here with this hanging over his people’s heads? For what? _Feelings?_ “Your people aren’t going to stand a chance! The Southern Tribe doesn’t even have any waterbenders anymore.”

Sokka smiles, his eyes as cold and deep as the endless night sky above them. “You think so?”


	7. anon: zuko/aang, future!fic, the blue spirit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anon's prompt:
> 
> zukaang, years down the like, reminiscing about the blue spirit [bc I'm a SAP]

There was something comforting about climbing onto the palace roof and finding Aang already there. The whole day had been frustrating from beginning to end, and Zuko had retired to his rooms rather than do what he wanted to do, which was burn the palace down around his advisors’ ears. Aang, as far as Zuko knew, had spent the past two weeks dealing with an internal Earth Kingdom territory dispute around the Si Wong Desert.  
  
He looked exhausted.

“You’re back,” Zuko said. He took a seat next to Aang’s sprawled form, in what had become his customary place for this rooftop chats, and examined the deep shadows under Aang’s eyes. Much of the roundness had left Aang’s face in the years since the end of the war and the weariness was much more obvious now than it had been.  
  
Aang flapped his hand at Zuko, not bothering to even lift his head. “Yep. It was a mess and a half.”  
  
Zuko forwent asking any specific questions about what had happened – the internal problems of the Earth Kingdom were best left alone by a Fire Nation ruler – and instead filled him in about Zuko’s latest frustrations with wrangling his advisors in the direction he wanted.  
  
“I don’t know how you stand it,” Aang said after Zuko had run out of steam. “Being pinned in every day, trapped in this big fishbowl for weeks at a time. They even tell you what to do and what to say! You’re the Fire Lord!”  
  
Zuko looked at Aang out of the corner of his good eye. That sounded a touch more personal than perhaps Aang meant to convey.  
  
“I think we have proof enough that maybe Fire Lords need to be told what to do every once in a while,” Zuko said dryly. They both winced, and Zuko hastily moved the conversation along. “Besides, I hired Jusha to tell me what to say, so you can’t really blame her for doing it.”  
  
“I guess,” Aang grumbled. He relaxed against the tiles and looked up at the night sky. It had been years, but he still wasn’t quite used to the sight. Even the stars had changed while he was lost beneath the ice.  
  
“You ever want to just…run away?” Aang asked wistfully.  
  
“Want to? Yes. But my duty is here, and I don’t want to…shirk that.”  
  
“Yeah,” Aang sighed. “I get that.”  
  
Duty. It trapped them both. Aang had to maintain balance in the world, and Zuko had to keep the Fire Nation from disrupting that balance once again.  
  
“We’ll take a vacation,” Zuko said suddenly. “As soon as we get the chance. No royal retinues, no advisors.”  
  
Aang shot up and grinned at him. “You could be the Blue Spirit again!”  
  
“I don’t have the mask anymore,” Zuko pointed out.  
  
“We’ll buy you a new one,” Aang said. He started pacing along the edge of the roof, uncaring – understandably – to how close he was to falling off. “They sell replicas now, and no one’s figured out he’s you. We’ll both wear disguises and travel around and fight bandits or something!”  
  
Zuko, who had seen Aang’s idea of a disguise before, wasn’t sure they’d be able to get away with it, but….  
  
“Yeah,” he said, smiling up at Aang. “Sounds like the perfect vacation.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like this turned out more platonic than I had intended, but c'est la vie ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

**Author's Note:**

> you can come talk ATLA to me on my [tumblr](https://snowdarkred.tumblr.com/).


End file.
